Did anyone notice the symbol of the yin-yang inside the octagon? It was on the door to the medicine chest, the jumpsuit that Desmond put on, and on the walls as the camera panned through the corridors.

Thougts?

Also, there was a ping pong paddle on the sofa in the HATCH.

I saw this image on another board just now. It's the I-ching symbol and it looks verrrrrry similar to what's in the logo.

http://www.rotten.com/library/occult/i-ching/iching3.jpg

I think that's it, although it was inside what looked to be an octagon.

Interesting, Yin Yang came up before, right? Boone's shirt, the black and white pebbles, are two that come to mind.

If you look at the thread that has screen shots.
It looks like an octagon with the letter F in it.

There are definitely words in the middle. I can't make it out with the copy I have. I'll have to download a higher res rip of the episode tomorrow :)

Here are some screenshots of just the logo:

http://timdorr.com/images/Lost/octagon.jpg

http://timdorr.com/images/Lost/octagon.big.jpg

It's nice having an HDTV card :grin:

Here's a cap of the octagon thing from the 720p broadcast. I even brightened it a little.
Octagon (http://img384.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostoctagon2hr.jpg)

There's not much that you can make out of the words in the middle, but I think I see an "MA" at the end.

I also found this link with the symbol in it about Feng-shui
http://www.homeexpo.com/guides/Fengshui.asp

It's nice having an HDTV card :grin:

Man, I've gotta take some time out to get mine working. Stupid MythTV makes it quite hard to get this all set up...

Wait, you captured it BEFORE the explosion. There's a very quick closeup of it AFTER the explosion, when he's closing the door. We may be able to make it out there.

It looked like the I-Ching.

Here is some info about it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Ching

Doesn't Jack have a ying-yang symbol on his arm?

Wait, you captured it BEFORE the explosion. There's a very quick closeup of it AFTER the explosion, when he's closing the door. We may be able to make it out there.

Good call on that

Octagon after the explosion (http://img354.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostoctagon21im.jpg)

Now at the beginning there looks like an O (maybe Q) and then an H.

The "O" also looks like it could be a "D" to me. Dharma maybe? Just don't tell me there's a Greg on the show, then...

Thats what I'm thinking too. Dharma. But what is that, a name, a company? What?

Why does it look more like the head/neck/top of a swan rather than the yin-yang symbol. Swan flu, avian virus? Spooky.

The patch seems to resemble the bagua from Feng Shui - which is used to create balance, harmony and prosperity - but here's the interesting part:

The bagua is developed from the Early Lo map. The early feng shui concepts developed from the belief that the "afterlife" of the ancestors played a role in their descendants physical existence on earth. Feng shui principles were applied to the landscape in order to find the most auspicious place to bury one's ancestors. The Chinese believed that if they buried their ancestors in an auspicious place, they they would look after them during their lives, and thus ensure that their lives were also auspicious. They respected the invisible, as well as the physical world.

(BTW - I found this in a book called "the feng shui companion" that has been sitting on my bookshelf for several years now. Haven't looked at it in a while, but suddenly tonight I'm looking at this symbol and was thinking, "where have I seen this before????" The early lo map was converted to the later lo map which was converted to the bagua - and the markings seem to indicate that this is a bagua)

'Dharma' makes sense

It looks like it's some kinda company, because it's on his computer too (twice)
Computer (http://img307.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostcomp22ct.jpg)

I had to brighten it up to the point of distortion to be able to see that one next to the monitor.

Does this resemble the tatoo on Jack's arm at all?

Dharma is a cosmic principle that is difficult, if not impossible, to define. Our Dharma is our true place in the cosmic process: in time, in space, in awareness, in thought, deed and desire. The eternal principle of Dharma determines the harmonious functions of the cosmic machine. In order that we fulfil our role in the divine play we must behave within our Dharma. That is, we ought to do the right thing, at the right time, In the right way, and for the right reason. By this we attain balance. To establish balance within ourselves ensures our own welfare and the welfare of society. And opens the path prepared for us by the divine.

Well okay then.
Dharma, the 70's, flu vaccines, Timothy Leary and Buckminster Fuller.

The letters look to me to read DHM8MA, however it could very possibly be Dharma, that would make more sense. The yin-yang symbol is definitely a white bird (swan) against a dark background. Not sure if that's intentional or what, but it's there.

Cheers!
Harv

Can anyone post a screen cap of Jack's tattoo?

I googled around and found a site about the tattoos

http://www.ece.neu.edu/~xzhu/lost_tatoo.html

Dunno how accurate it is, but you can see it pretty well.

The eight symbols on the logo are the eight I Ching trigrams arranged in, what seems to me to be, reverse directional order. Each trigram has an element and direction associated with it. Starting from the top and moving clockwise they are: Fire/South, Earth/SouthWest, Swamp/West, Heaven/NorthWest, Water/North, Mountain/NorthEast, Thunder/East, and Wind/SouthEast. I'm not sure what this means other than prop designers did their homework.

Oh, so its a reall tattoo that Matthew Fox has. Dang, i thought it was connected with the symbol. Booo. haha.

The eight symbols on the logo are the eight I Ching trigrams arranged in, what seems to me to be, reverse directional order. Each trigram has an element and direction associated with it. Starting from the top and moving clockwise they are: Fire/South, Earth/SouthWest, Swamp/West, Heaven/NorthWest, Water/North, Mountain/NorthEast, Thunder/East, and Wind/SouthEast. I'm not sure what this means other than prop designers did their homework.

And the letters are reversed also. I thought the letter in the center looked like an R.

If you change everything to this: amrmhd, google asks if you mean: amr mhd. Which brings up a lot of web pages on fusion energy.

umm doesn;t it look like a stadium to anyone else?

Read it backwards, guys!
What if you held it to a mirror - ARMAND.
Look at it very closely.

Ties to Danielle's science team?
Makes sense, given the nature of what's in the hatch.

I think it says Dharma...

Doesn't the octagon kinda look like the Oceanic logo?

I think it says Dharma...

Me too. But think Island is right. But that doesn't help to explain the swan.

Look at the R. It's backwards.

Look at the R. It's backwards.

Nice catch... I was wondering why it looked 8ish

I rather like what dharma stands for but I think that Peffe did a play on what would be a Hurley comment? I agreed. Guess not.

Bed time...........

yeah i think it says dharma.... too

So, we've got Dharma, we've got a swan, we know its a logo. Is it too far of a stretch to pretty much explain the entire series thusly:

Desmond is a representative of a group that turns spiritual "ugly ducklings" into "swans". "We were all sent here for a reason." To evolve into who we are supposed to be. Kind of a large scale version of The Game.

Any takers?

Enhanced it further...

Click here for image. (http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b188/lemmartswan/lostoctagon21im.jpg)

I thought I caught some kind of symbol on Desmond's zip up "work shirt" when he was putting it on in the Hatch......

....also there was some kind of logo/symbol on Desmond's shirt when he was in the stadium....

I'd love to have screenshots of those for comparison.

There's definitely something on his shirt. Most likely a name tag.

I found this site which gives us some pics from in the hatch, the octagon, the medication, the mural on the wall. Check it out http://www.thetailsection.com/

The I Ching says that Time is a series of identifiable elements in flux. There are 64 of these "elements." [Terence McKenna] believes that what we today call the I Ching is but a tiny fragment of a once immense device, now forever lost.
check this link for information on the theory... (http://fusionanomaly.net/timewavezero.html) (LOST writers are very fond of wild theories, conspirations... The Timewave Zero concept places a "transcendental object at the end of time" around 2012)

dhar·ma (därm, dûr-) KEY

NOUN:

Hinduism & Buddhism
The principle or law that orders the universe.
Individual conduct in conformity with this principle.
The essential function or nature of a thing.
Hinduism Individual obligation with respect to caste, social custom, civil law, and sacred law.
Buddhism
The body of teachings expounded by the Buddha.
Knowledge of or duty to undertake conduct set forth by the Buddha as a way to enlightenment.
One of the basic, minute elements from which all things are made.

Brahma, the Creator of the World and the Progenitor of All Living Things, is the third member of the Hindu trinity. He is the keeper of cosmic time and a sort of master-of-ceremonies advancing story lines in myths, but he is not actively worshiped. In sculpture and painting, Brahma has four heads and four arms, each one holding sway over a quarter of the universe and signifying the four Vedas. The rosary that he counts in one hand represents time, and his lotus seat represents the earth. Brahma's vehicle is the swan, symbol of the freedom that comes with knowledge. His consort is Saraswati, the goddess of learning

The ba gua are arranged in a circle similar to a Native American Medicine Wheel. There are 40,320 possible combinations of these ba gua in a circle. Only two arrangements are used in feng shui: these are the Pre-Heaven formula (Hsien Tien) and the Post-Heaven formula (also known as the Lo Map) which is the formula that creates the magic square of 15. The Post-Heaven formula arrangement of the ba gua has many uses in feng shui but chief among them are travel, relocation, floor plans, and interior design.
http://www.bartlettdesigns.com/fengshui-baguaoctagon.html

Interesting discussion. To me, the first letter looks sorta like a Q, as in QHARMA.

I keep reading that everyone thinks this looks like the ying-yang symbol...but to me it looks more like a swan with the black defining its outline...am I just blind?

umm doesn;t it look like a stadium to anyone else?

I was just thinking that! "Tour de stad"?

It looks like it says Sigma, as in a corporation called Sigma...

Also, sigma in mathematics is used to identify summations... might have something to do with the 108s?

It should be noted that both the Octagon and Swan are both sybolic of Vishnu. Add Dharma (A Hindu god, the personification of the divine inner 'law' (dharma). He was originally a creator god and the son of Brahma, but he is also considered as an avatar of Vishnu.) and you get a distinctively Indian mythology heavily leaning on Vishnu.

Vishnu is regarded as a major god in Hinduism and Indian mythology. He is thought as the preserver of the universe while two other major Hindu gods Brahma and Shiva, are regarded respectively, as the creator and destroyer of the universe. In some Puranic literature Vishnu is said to be eternal, an all-pervading spirit, and associated with the primeval waters that are believed to have been omnipresent before the creation of the universe. The concept of Vishnu being the preserver of the world came relatively late in Hinduism. Presumedly it sprang from two other beliefs: that men attain salvation by faithfully following predetermined paths of duty, and that powers of good and evil (gods and demons) are in contention for domination over the world. When these powers are upset Vishnu, it is further believed, descends to earth, or his avatar, to equalized the powers. Further it is thought that ten such incarnations or reincarnations of Vishnu will occur. Nine descents are said to have already occurred, the tenth is yet to come. Rama and Krishna were the seventh and eighth.

much to think about...

hey, i think that symbol also has something to do with feng shui...i'm not sure, so i don't wanna specify. besides, i saw it in an anime--they called it a "hakke" crystal. i typed hakke in google and found a similar symbol. interesting.

the bagau symbol wards off evil spirits.

As far as it being reversed and part of Danielle's science team - not unless it's someone we don't know yet.
1. Danielle
2. Robert
3. Montand
4. Brandon? (from Danielle's transmission)
5. ??
6. ??

I thought I caught some kind of symbol on Desmond's zip up "work shirt" when he was putting it on in the Hatch......

....also there was some kind of logo/symbol on Desmond's shirt when he was in the stadium....

I'd love to have screenshots of those for comparison.

Alright, I got both screens
Jumpsuit (http://img339.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostjumpsuit0sv.jpg)
Desmond's Shirt (http://img339.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostdesmond2iy.jpg)

The work shirt is definitely the octagon symbol, the stadium one looks like some kinda bird.

Alright, I got both screens
Jumpsuit (http://img339.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostjumpsuit0sv.jpg)
Desmond's Shirt (http://img339.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lostdesmond2iy.jpg)

The work shirt is definitely the octagon symbol, the stadium one looks like some kinda bird.

A Phoenix, perhaps?

The logo form - Octagon implies danger in official use.

The thing in the middle could very much be a form of Yin Yang symbol but looks kind of distorted.

About the lines within the octagon... well, in Feng Shui there´s someting called Trigrams. It´s common to arrange them in terms of eight, wich is often done within a shape of an octagon.

Now, what it means I don´t know, but it adds upp pretty well. Some explanation of the different functions of the Trigrams you can find here (http://www.kheper.net/topics/I_Ching/trigrams.htm).
Some meanings are: heaven/father, thunder/eldest son, earth/mother, mountain/youngest son. Check them out! I know you guys can find someting smart in them!

I hope this can make us all get further ;)

/Liam

Found this on another forum and did'nt see the "108" significance mentioned here, sorry if it has:
http://www.shaolinhungmei.org/theory2.html
The "Pa Qua" is the eight sided (octagon) figure which is part of Hung Mei's school identity. However, its meaning goes much deeper than merely that of being a logo.
The figure consists of 24 sections - eight sides multiplied by the three lines drawn on each side. These sections represent the 24 hours in a day. The sequence of broken and solid lines shown on each side of the Pa Qua are indicative of the times during the day when our 108 critical points of the body are safe from injuries which could otherwise cause serious harm.
There is a relationship between the theories of Oo Heng and Pa Qua. The Pa Qua teaches when the various critical points of the body are the most vulnerable to attack. Oo Heng teaches the techniques which can be used to effectively attack those points. Together, they make a powerful weapon to be used in the defense against an opponent.

And there we have the numbers!
Look at what the trigrams stand for here (http://www.kheper.net/topics/I_Ching/trigrams.htm).
We need to know wich lines in the symbol that stand for each of the numbers. I think we can figure out that each number represents a person on the island. And them as a group is the 108. Together they mean someting!

Regarding Matthew Fox's tattoo: I read (somewhere in all the spoiler stuff I've read) that TPTB had decided to work one of Matthew's real tattoos into the plot. At the time I thought WTF but it appears they have done it!

check out the super I-Ching

http://www.superiching.com/

On Stadium Desmonds shirt....
A Phoenix, perhaps?
My thoughts exactly

The Nomad (aka You know Who) just posted on the linear board - he said, "the swan awaits us all."

A swan it is.






Or his post has a totally different meaning... :D

Did it not jump out to anyone else that there are 64 hexagrams that can be made with the trigrams of the I Ching and that the 6 numbers could each correspond to a particular hexagram?

Just to pick out a few random selections:
4 - MENG : cover, pull over, hide, conceal; lid or cover; clouded awareness, dull; ignorance, immaturity; unseen beginnings. The ideogram: plant and covered, hidden growth.
8 - PI : order things and put them in classes, compare and select; find what you belong with; compare, sort, examine correspondances; select and harmonize; unite. The ideogram: person who stops walking, looking around to examine and compare.
15 - CH'IEN : think and speak of yourself in a modest way; respectful, unassuming, retiring, unobtrusive; yielding, compliant, reverent, lowly. The ideogram: words and unite, keeping words close to the underlaying facts.
16 - YU : ready, prepared for, prearrange, take precaution, think beforehand; satisfied, contented, at ease. The ideogram: son and elephant, careful, reverent, and very strong.
23 - PO : flay, peel skin; remove, uncover, degrade, split, slice; reduce to essentials; slaughter an animal. The ideogram : knife and carve, trenchant action.
42 - YI : increase, advance, promote, benefit, strengthen; pour in more; full, superabundant; restorative. The ideogram: water and a vessel, pouring in more

My brain isn't working so I can't make any sense of this yet, but my gut tells me there is something to this. Maybe we need a better translation.

Here's a thought. I used to study tae kwon do and when I saw this symbol it reminded me a lot of the Korean flag.

I don't know how to post pictures or links here, but if you google "Korean flag picture" you'll see it. The flag has the yin yang in the center with four symbols around it (heaven, water, fire, earth), and those symbols are on the logo in the hatch.

So I'm wondering if there's a connection between whatever company or entity is behind the hatch and Sun's father??

Just a thought.

Regarding Matthew Fox's tattoo: I read (somewhere in all the spoiler stuff I've read) that TPTB had decided to work one of Matthew's real tattoos into the plot. At the time I thought WTF but it appears they have done it!

I had asked earlier ( I think it was this thread) If anyone saw the resemblance to M Fox's tattoo. I am glad I am not the only one.